Should I re-read The Hobbit?

[Searching_For_Truth]

Read it if you have the time. It’s worth it in my eyes.

[urban1]

IMHO, the books should be a tetrology (sp?) and should be read begining with The Hobbit. There is just too much expository information in that book which is poorly covered in the trilogy. Just, for instance, where did Frodo get that ring, anyway (the essence of the story)?

I have read the series many times and I don’t think I would have gotten through it the first time without reading The Hobbit first.

BTW, the story I heard was that JRR wrote Hobbit, after he had already started the trilogy, as a preface.

[bafaa]

*Originally posted by GuanoLad *
**I am reading LotR right now…
…I have read hundreds of books that I’ve found better written… **

I think at least part the problem is that you are reading it NOW after having read hundreds of books that were heavily influenced by it and therefore finding similarities, cliches, and the like. So yes, in that case it does seem dated but remember that LotR started those cliches. Not that knowing that will make it more enjoyable for you and that’s too bad.

LotR and The Hobbit were some of the first fantasy books I ever read waaay back in grammar school. I loved them and couldn’t put them down because I had NEVER read anything like it. It was all new to me.

[GuanoLad]

*Originally posted by bafaa *
**

*Originally posted by GuanoLad *
**I am reading LotR right now…
…I have read hundreds of books that I’ve found better written… **

I think at least part the problem is that you are reading it NOW after having read hundreds of books that were heavily influenced by it and therefore finding similarities, cliches, and the like. So yes, in that case it does seem dated but remember that LotR started those cliches. Not that knowing that will make it more enjoyable for you and that’s too bad.**

Actually I was very conscious of trying not to do that. I don’t think LotR has many cliches at all - it’s more the style of writing that I don’t like - the prose, the character development, the lack of detail where I expect it, the overabundance of detail where it’s not needed… that kind of thing.

[dantheman]

*Originally posted by GuanoLad *
Actually I was very conscious of trying not to do that. I don’t think LotR has many cliches at all - it’s more the style of writing that I don’t like - the prose, the character development, the lack of detail where I expect it, the overabundance of detail where it’s not needed… that kind of thing.

Well, as with any book, if the style doesn’t work for you, it doesn’t work for you. No harm, no foul. Some people just don’t get into the rich details.

[rowrrbazzle]

*Originally posted by Fiver *
Speaking of inconsistencies, I never quite understood why they call Sauron the “Necromancer” in The Hobbit.

There’s a great two-part article about the trilogy up at Salon. It talks at length about Tolkien himself and about the genesis of the work.

Get a copy of Tolkien’s Letters. It’s essential if you want to learn as much as possible about his stories. IIRC, in one of the letters, he says that he wasn’t sure himself whether the Necromancer was Sauron until LotR developed a bit. In a similar vein, he says somewhere that he didn’t know at first who Strider was when he showed up in Bree.

A letter from Robert Rubin on this Salon page contains this funny item:

…at the recent BookExpo America in Chicago… A reporter there even asked someone from Houghton Mifflin, Tolkien’s U.S. publisher, if they would publish a “novelization” to go along with the film!

This page of the Salon article contains this passage:

That doesn’t mean, on the other hand, that “The Lord of the Rings” is ever fully comfortable with heterosexuality. Its female characters are little more than idealized figures of inspiration or decoration; Eowyn, the warrior-princess of Rohan, is the only real exception. (Was her original a female graduate student who braved the pipe smoke and postprandial glasses of port?) Her courtship by Faramir of Gondor is stylized and awkward but at least has the flavor of real emotion. If you still believe that the book has no more explicit depiction of heterosexual activity than that, however, I suggest you take another look at the disturbing encounter between Sam and Shelob, the huge and evil female spider, at the end of Book Four.

But I am mainly here to praise Tolkien, not to bury him, and one bizarrely sexualized scene between hobbit and arachnid does not spoil my enjoyment of “The Lord of the Rings.”

:rolleyes:

I can only respond with Adam Duritz’s words quoted in the latest Staff Report: “Why do people go there, you know?”

[Fiver]

Rosebud:

Fiver, if you really want to do a discussion thread about The Hobbit, count me in! I’ve been planning to reread the LOTR trilogy before the movies too.

Excellent. Why don’t we start around the beginning of July? Who else is interested?

[sub]Now if you’d all like to gather 'round, Rosebud, Queen of the Geeks, will tell you how she and her friend Kat actually got teary-eyed watching LOTR trailers at DragonCon…[/sub]

If you’ve really got a story here, I’d love to hear it.

BTW, you still probably not coming to Dragoncon this year? Even knowing about the Episode II trailer?

[Katisha]

*Originally posted by Fiver *
**Excellent. Why don’t we start around the beginning of July? Who else is interested?
**

Me! Me!

BTW, I got Tom Shippey’s book on Tolkien (as mentioned in Salon) for my birthday – it’s really fascinating stuff. Lots of ammo for a discussion thread…